 | Essential Library of Congress Subject Headings Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) are increasingly seen as 'the' English language controlled vocabulary, despite their lack of a theoretical foundation, and their evident US bias. In mapping exercises between national subject heading lists, and in exercises in digital resource organization and management, LCSH are often chosen because of the lack of any other widely accepted English language standard for subject cataloguing. It is therefore important that the basic nature of LCSH, their advantages, and their limitations, are well understood both by LIS practitioners and those in the wider information community. Readership : There is a strong emphasis throughout on worked examples and practical exercises in the application of the scheme, and a full glossary of terms is supplied. No prior knowledge or experience of subject cataloguing is assumed. This is an indispensable guide to LCSH for practitioners and students alike. Vanda Broughton MA DipLib is Programme Director for the Diploma/MA in Library and Information Studies at the School of Library, Archive and Information Studies, University College London. She has taught, written and led training courses on classification for many years. She is joint editor of the new edition of the Bliss Bibliographic Classification scheme, is a member of the UDC revision working group, and also of the UK Classification Research Group. |
